ORC | Week 1 | Nursery Nook

First off, if you haven’t heard of the One Room Challenge, it is an event where 20 designers are chosen to transform a space, and normal folk like me, are welcome to participate as a guest. Make sure to check out the designers and guest’s spaces that I link at the end of this post!

The event is biannual, with a spring and fall edition. Last spring I participated for the first time when we did our backyard makeover. There was a lot of heavy lifting for that project!

This time around I am hoping that the small space will mean less grinding work. The only catch is I am currently pregnant….and due in November!

Which leads us to why I signed up. I need deadlines and plans to get things done! This challenge will keep me on track to (hopefully) finish our nursery nook on time! Can your girl do it? You’ll have to tune in each to see 😉

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The space

Our bedroom has a small pop out that I refer to as a nook. It measures in at 4×6.

My goal is to create a cozy cocoon-like space for the babe (I’ll call her Baby This Dear Casa or Baby TDC for short) to spend her first few months. Eventually she will share a room with her older brother while we transform an unfinished closet into her bedroom.

The plan

When I first thought of a small nursery, I immediately thought of Whitney Leigh Morris’ Closet Nursery. Have you seen it? It is so clever.

Well actually, to be honest, what I first thought of was how sleep deprived I will be for months (neigh, years!)! Haaaa!

So this space will be dedicated to encouraging as much sleep as possible with a newborn who wakes every couple hours to feed and occasionally cluster feeds for hours straight.

Enter the Snoo. Have you heard of this gadget? It is a pricey bassinet that will soothe a baby back to sleep. You can rent them, which is what I plan to do. I aim to skimp on all other costs in order to splurge on this. I so hope it works for us! Crossing my fingers, toes, eyes and everything else.

Nursery necessities

Changing table dresser

Other than the bassinet, I have been searching for a vintage dresser that I can use as a changing table. The piece I have in the space isn’t deep enough to fit the changing pad. Also, I want to find something that will one day be in babe’s room.

Every time I find something I like on Facebook Marketplace, Nextdoor, or Craigslist it is already scooped up or the seller never responds. The piece above had already been claimed while I was messaging the seller. The search continues!

Pretty rug

As I plan for this space, I am also envisioning how I can later re-use these pieces when Baby TDC moves into her own space. When I actually go to create her own room, I may have another vision entirely!

Totally possible, seeing as how I set out to find a Persian style rug with a medallion (like the one above), but then saw the sweet gingham rug and was smitten. I haven’t made the purchase yet, so nothing is settled. The top rug is more pricey, while the bottom option is a fraction of the cost and smaller.

Black out curtains

I found these IKEA black out curtains on National Thrift Shop Day! They were marked at $7 each, but there was a further discount taken at the register. I plan to hang them on the windows and across the nook opening to create that cocoon coziness I mentioned. I have a rod that I plan to spray paint brass to match the rod over the windows currently.

Soothing paint

I haven’t picked a color yet, but I want a light pink, almost imperceptible blush color. I better choose a rug quickly so I can match up the paint!

ORC | Week 1 | Nursery Nook

There you have it. The tiny nook nursery. Next week I’ll share the cleaned out space and hopefully have some rug and dresser purchases, and perhaps paint the curtain rod. I’ll be sharing some process stuff in my stories, so check those out to see me waddle around lol.

Thanks for visiting! Make sure to check out the designers and other guests’ projects HERE! I am really excited to see some familiar faces like friends who are joining for the first time or 5th time and to make some new friends too!